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 THE BIG HIT. Hong Kong director Che-Kirk Wong directed
this slam-bang action/comedy/parody slush, providing yet another
reason for ending our love affair with tongue-in-cheek violence.
Mark Wahlberg plays that new breed of comic hero, the Funny Hit-Man.
Hopelessly insecure and yet super-competent when it comes to killing,
Wahlberg's character is about as funny as a whimpering Doberman
that occasionally mauls babies. One minute he's cute and soft-spoken,
the next minute he's chopping off somebody's leg. Taken as an
irreverent joke for the hipster teenage set, The Big Hit
does have some amusing ideas (the climax revolves around Wahlberg's
efforts to return an overdue video while evading assassins), but
the empty-headed screenplay can't keep up with them. This movie's
idea of witty dialogue is when somebody says "Do you want
the truth?" and somebody else shouts, "You can't handle
the truth!" That's not parody; that's parroty. --Woodruff
BULWORTH. Warren Beatty's hilarious and intelligent new
film successfully resurrects the political comedy. The fast-moving
plot follows Senator Jay Bulworth through the final weekend of
his campaign to win the Democratic primary for California. Having
hired someone to kill him so that his daughter can collect a large
life insurance policy, Bulworth is suddenly liberated from his
need to win and begins saying what's on his mind. The script is
full of extremely funny and politically astute commentary by the
increasingly demented Bulworth, and it doesn't lose steam throughout
its 107 minutes. Everything about this movie seems to run contrary
to the current style of filmmaking: There's a plot which unfolds
and deepens throughout; the hip-hop soundtrack is fresh and adds
mood, rather than emphasizing what is already obvious; there's
a rhythm to the pacing that keeps things moving without pandering
to an imaginary attention-deficit disordered audience; the comedy
is cerebral and profanity is used only in service of the larger
theme. And instead of giant reptiles, the villains are insurance
companies. Just like in real life. --DiGiovanna
DEEP IMPACT. With a massive comet coming to destroy the
Earth, everyone tries to mend their childhood traumas by producing
the most maudlin speeches ever heard. What happened to the good
old days when the end of the world meant marauding gangs of leather-clad
bikers and violence in the street? In Deep Impact it seems
like everyone is too bored to go out looting and rioting, so they
just hang out watching the skies and waiting for the special effects.
After 90 minutes of watching these whiny losers you'll be rooting
for the comet. --DiGiovanna
GODZILLA. In the original pictures, Godzilla was like an
overgrown child throwing a tantrum, and I don't know about you,
but that's why I loved him. In the new Godzilla, he exists
on a purely biological level, motivated only to eat and to breed.
With neither political themes nor anthropomorphism to sustain
him, the sole reason to root for Godzilla is to see him destroy
things while protecting his territory. Even then, this over-marketed,
under-scripted special-effects vehicle doesn't deliver enough;
in fact, director Roland Emmerich and producer Dean Devlin eliminate
the big lizard from the movie's entire second act! Instead, we're
introduced to Godzilla's spawn, several dozen man-sized babies
who move, cast shadows, and produce visual puns exactly, and I
do mean exactly, like Steven Spielberg's velociraptors. Yes, this
is the Jurassic Park 3 you didn't know was coming. Sure,
Godzilla turns up again, but his revival can't save the movie
any more than that last-minute blue, singing alien could save
The Fifth Element. As for the actors, Godzilla stars
Matthew Broderick and Maria Pitillo in a wimpy love story that
has no business being in a Godzilla picture. Fortunately, Jean
Reno was thrown in to liven up the mix. He's the movie's one saving
grace: a sleepy-eyed action hero who cusses in French. --Woodruff
HE GOT GAME. Spike Lee can't help himself--he's always
taking on the grand themes, with varying levels of success. Here,
he takes on The Game, i.e. Life, i.e. Basketball--and he scores!
He Got Game is a long, ambitious movie about the country's
best high-school basketball player negotiating the difficult terrain
of success. Everyone wants a piece of Jesus Shuttlesworth (Ray
Allen), a focused, talented, and personable kid--including his
father Jake (Denzel Washington), a murderer who's been let out
of prison briefly to try to persuade Jesus to sign up with a university
referred to only by the Kafkaesque moniker, "Big State."
The plot is so contrived that it actually turns a corner and becomes
believable again. (Who could make this up?) Somehow Lee pulls
it all off with aplomb. His filmmaking style is as fresh and wonderfully
visual as ever, and the story has some of the heart-stabbing tension
of Hoop Dreams. The score is by Aaron Copeland and Public
Enemy--which gives some indication of Lee's territorial range.
--Richter
HOPE FLOATS. After Birdee Pruitt's (Sandra Bullock) husband
leaves her for her best friend on national TV, Birdee goes into
a deep depression. She spends most of the day sleeping, waking
only to have whiny fits. This goes on for 90 minutes while her
childhood sweetheart (played by muscled man-flesh love-god Harry
Connick Jr.) makes long speeches about the American dream and
tries to get Birdee to quit pouting and have sex with him. This
incredibly slow and largely plotless film was supposed to be Bullock's
"reward" for agreeing to make Speed II, but why
anyone would think this maudlin tripe would make an amusing movie
is beyond me. If watching moss grow while embarrassingly trite
dialogue plays in the background is your idea of fun, don't miss
Hope Floats. --DiGiovanna
LOVE AND DEATH ON LONG ISLAND. Distinguished British actor
John Hurt teams up with not-so-distinguished pretty boy Jason
Priestly in this at first quirkily comic, then sublimely haunting
film. Hurt plays a reclusive old novelist who accidentally catches
a Porky's-like teen movie called Hotpants College II
and finds himself obsessed with its star, who, in an amusing case
of art imitating life, is a none-too-talented heartthrob played
by Priestly. Because Hurt's character is so nervously out of touch,
you're never quite sure whether his is an uncovered Lolita
complex with a homosexual spin, or simply high culture falling
(hard) for pop culture--and that makes the film funny. Cute gives
way to disturbing, though, during the second half, when Hurt journeys
to Long Island to actually meet Priestley. Fantasy and reality
aren't supposed to butt heads, especially for someone as desperate
as Hurt's character. But the conclusion, while inevitable, is
both surprising and touching. Director Richard Kwietniowski owes
most of the film's success to Hurt's richly great acting, but
he also uses Priestly very well here, gently mocking his position
in the acting world and getting the most out of his looks. The
expression on Priestley's face at the end will stay with you long
after the dialogue has faded away.
--Woodruff
THE OBJECT OF MY AFFECTION. This film has been deceptively
marketed and shot as a fuzzy-wuzzy romantic comedy. Actually,
it's a difficult and long-winded melodrama. Jennifer Aniston plays
a pouty Brooklynite who dumps her boyfriend because she's smitten
with her gay male roommate; Paul Rudd is the sweet-faced love
object who reluctantly agrees to help the pregnant Aniston raise
her child. Their intimate but sexually frustrating relationship
would be plenty compelling if the movie could focus on it for
more than two seconds. Instead, peripheral characters are repeatedly
introduced and developed while the leads become disturbingly remote.
The more the plot shifts in emphasis (with Rudd flaking out on
the increasingly whiny Aniston to pursue a male lover), the more
the two come across as outsiders in their own story. Not much
rings true here: For all the script's insights about unrequited
love and the meaning of "family," the picture is too
leaden to be effective. One plus: Nigel Hawthorne (The Madness
of King George) almost saves the show as a gay theatre critic
who struggles to maintain dignity in the face of romantic humiliation.
--Woodruff
A PERFECT MURDER. Gwyneth Paltrow plays the impossibly
beautiful young wife of evil, aged investment banker Michael Douglas
in this remake of Dial M For Murder. When Douglas realizes
Paltrow is having an affair with a young artist (played by smoky-hot
Viggo Mortensen), he hatches an elaborate plot for revenge. The
suspense film is one of the more difficult genres to pull off,
but director Andrew Davis, cinematographer Dariusz Wolski and
composer James Newton Howard synergistically combine to drop all
the elements into place. Wolski, best known for inventing the
neo-gothic style of cinematography seen in The Crow and
Dark City, uses a much more subtle approach here, courageously
shooting empty rooms and static scenes to create a threatening
atmosphere and keep the viewer off-balance. The film is also notable
for the Arabic-speaking police detective who's portrayed as smart,
efficient and sympathetic, a rare departure from the normally
stereotyped representation of Muslim peoples in Hollywood movies.
The only flaws in this nerve-wracking outing are Michael Douglas'
exaggerated performance and a slight loss of momentum in the final
confrontation. Still, this is precision filmmaking that will leave
you reaching for the nitroglycerin tablets.
--DiGiovanna
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